My techno-horror story Blame has been published by The Dread Machine. It’s a “found footage” story consisting of emails, Slack conversations, Reddit threads, phone transcripts, and more unusual artifacts like git commits, JIRA tickets, door entry logs … even a Walmart receipt.
Also, like many found footage tales, the story is ultimately pieced together based on incomplete information. Multiple reads of the story should reveal new hidden details that change the your interpretation of the ending.
The Tales to Terrify podcast has produced my short horror story Baby Food as a standalone episode. It’s a story about pregnancy, giant insects, and a camping trip gone horribly wrong. As usual, the narrator did an incredible job, perfectly nailing the pace and tone. The story starts at around the 6:40 mark and runs for just under an hour. You can listen to it on any of your favorite podcast apps and websites:
You can also read the story online, or buy the All Dark Places 3 anthology where it originally appeared.
And if you missed the earlier Tales to Terrify episodes featuring my stories, check out their productions of Something’s Wrong With Mom and Those Who Turn From God.
My cryptid horror story No Bones, Just Skin has been accepted by Scare Street for another Night Terrors anthology. The story is based on the legend of the abúhukü, a rainforest demon feared by the Cubeo people of the Colombian Amazon, known for leaving the boneless corpses of abducted villagers draped in the treetops around the jungle.
The third and final installment of my cyberpunk thriller Override has been published in Dark Matter Magazine Issue 009. Override is a three-part serial novella that started in Issue 007 and continued in Issue 008.
In Part One, Delek Foster volunteers himself to Syntech be converted into an AI-driven automaton in exchange for Syntech taking care of his wife (Neera) and his sickly son (Sev) for the rest of their lives. But something goes wrong, and the deal falls through. Delek is taken away by Syntech, leaving Neera and Sev with nothing. Part One ends with Neera setting out on a mission to free Delek from Syntech.
In Part Two, Neera finds a shady underworld boss who has an interrupter technology he claims can override Syntech’s AI. She cons him into giving her an interrupter in exchange for a useless bank auth key that he thinks he can use to undermine his criminal rivals. After hijacking a Syntech van, Neera is able to track Delek to the location where he is stationed. She attempts to use the interrupter to free Delek, but things don’t go as planned. Neera is captured by Delek himself, who seems to have no memory of his wife. To make matters worse, Delek is working for the very underworld boss that Neera just conned. And he is not happy.
What happens next? You’ll need to read Part Three to find out.
My short horror story Genie’s Last Wish has been published in the Beyond, Volume 1 anthology by The Great Void Books.
Two of my horror drabbles, Curiosity Kills and Scrapple, have been accepted by Shacklebound Books for their Short Horror Stories anthology.
Curiosity Kills tells the story of a cat who brings home an increasingly disturbing series of offerings to its owner. It was originally printed in the Extreme Drabbles of Dread anthology by Macabre Ladies Publishing.
Scrapple is the story of a battered woman and her abusive husband, and what happens when they stop off at a roadside diner for breakfast. It first appeared in Dark Moments by Black Hare Press.
My dystopian drabble Burn the Night will be joining Like a Moth to a Flame and A Whisper and a Scream in the Planetside anthology by Shacklebound Books.
My sci-fi drabbles, A Whisper and a Scream and Like a Moth to a Flame, have been accepted by Shacklebound Books for their Planetside anthology.
My body horror short story A Thing of Beauty has been published in the Screaming in the Night anthology by Sinister Smile Press. When a caterpillar turns into a butterfly, the memories of the pain inflicted upon it before the metamorphosis persists, despite its new physical form. The same happens to people as well …
Warren Benedetto 